Honorable William Thomas, Chairman
Committee on House Oversight
United States House of Representatives
Washington, DC 20515

Honorable John Warner, Chairman
Committee on Rules
United States Senate
Washington, DC 20510

RE: Placing Congressional Research Service Reports and Products on
the Internet

Dear Chairmen Thomas and Warner:

On June 25th, the Joint Committee on the Library of Congress appointed
a task force consisting of Senator Thad Cochran (R-MS) and Representative
Vern Ehlers (R-MI) to recommend whether some Congressional Research Service
(CRS) Reports and products should be made available to the public via the
Internet. We are concerned that the appointment of a task force will simply
delay placing CRS products on the Internet.

As Chairmen of the internal administrative committees of the House of
Representatives and Senate, each of you has the authority at present to
place CRS products on the Internet. Many of these CRS products are currently
available to Members of Congress and their staffs on an internal congressional
intranet. We are writing to urge you to place all generic CRS products
on the Internet, which would improve citizens' ability to identify and
obtain them.

The Congressional Research Service is a taxpayer-funded research organization
within the Library of Congress, with an annual budget of nearly $63 million.
It is a research arm of the U. S. Congress, staffed by hundreds of talented
independent issue experts who prepare valuable reports and information
products, including CRS Reports, Info Packs, Issue Briefs, and Audio Briefs.
During fiscal year 1996, CRS prepared more than 1,000 new written research
products for the Congress.

But Congress distributes few CRS products via the Internet. Citizens
cannot obtain most CRS products directly. Instead, we must engage in the
burdensome and time-consuming process of requesting a member of Congress
to send CRS products to us. Often, citizens must wait for weeks or even
months before such a request is filled. This barrier to obtaining CRS products
serves no useful purpose, and harms citizens' ability to participate in
the congressional legislative process.

Instead of waiting for a member of Congress to send CRS products, citizens
may purchase them from a commercial vendor. For example, Penny Hill Press
charges an annual subscription rate of $190 per year plus $2.75 per CRS
report plus 2.5 cents per page. Nonsubscribers pay $47 for up to five CRS
reports.

House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA) has repeatedly supported placing
congressional materials on the Internet. On November 11, 1994, in a speech
to the Washington Research Group Symposium, he promised that "we will change
the rules of the House to require that all documents and all conference
reports and all committee reports be filed electronically as well as in
writing and that they cannot be filed until they are available to any citizen
who wants to pull them up. Thus, information will be available to every
citizen in the country at the same moment it is available to the highest
paid Washington lobbyist."

Despite Speaker Gingrich's speech more than 2 years ago, most CRS products
are available electronically only to Members of Congress and their staffs.
On June 5, 1997, CRS Director Daniel Mulhollan boasted in testimony to
Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on the Legislative Branch that "the
CRS Home Page makes available online exclusively to congressional offices
all CRS issue briefs and numerous reports....Through our Home Page the
Congress has integrated access to a wide range of products and information.
This service is now readily accessible electronically to Members and staff
24 hours a day." But not to citizens.

Nothing in the statutory charter of the CRS, or any other federal law
or House or Senate rule, prevents Congress from placing these CRS products
on the Internet. No change in federal law, nor House nor Senate Rule is
required to place CRS products on the Internet. Neither the Joint Committee
on the Library, nor the Senate Rules Committee, nor the House Oversight
Committee need approve placing CRS products on the Internet. This is an
internal administrative matter. Both Chairman Thomas and Chairman Warner
separately have the authority to place CRS products on the House and Senate
World Wide Web sites.

Although the 105th and 104th Congresses have made an effort to place
some congressional documents on the Internet, many important congressional
materials are still not available on the Internet, including most committee
prints and discussion drafts of bills, chairman's marks, voting records
in a non-partisan database, most transcripts of hearings, texts of committee
and floor amendments, transcripts of committee mark-ups, franked mass mailings,
lobbyist disclosure reports, Statements of Disbursements of the House,
and Secretary of the Senate reports.

In his House and Senate testimony, CRS Director Mulhollan highlighted
the benefits that the CRS provides to new Members of Congress. He noted
that CRS "offer[s] assistance tailored to the unique needs of new Members."
Many of those needs are for general briefing materials on substantive and
procedural matters. Such briefing materials could be of great use to citizens
as well. James Madison aptly described the need for such public information
when he wrote that "A popular government, without popular information,
or the means of acquiring it, is but a Prologue to a Farce or a Tragedy;
or, perhaps both. Knowledge will forever govern ignorance: And a people
who mean to be their own Governors, must arm themselves with the power
that knowledge gives."

The Congressional Research Service produces some of the best research
in the federal government. We believe that taxpayers ought to be able to
read the research that we pay for. We urge you to place these valuable
CRS products -- including CRS Reports, Info Packs, Issue Briefs, and Audio
Briefs -- on the Internet.